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Drama on the freewayDuane Innes (on the cover)Kent, Washington

DUANE INNES was on his way to a Seattle Mariners baseball game on July 23, 2010, with
his adult children and some neighbors when he
noticed a Ford F-150 truck drifting across the lanes
of State Route 167. He knew something was wrong
when the driver had no reaction to scraping against
the concrete divider barrier.

Innes, 52, pulled up to the truck to see the driver,
Bill Pace, whose low blood pressure had caused him
to lose consciousness, slumped over the wheel. Innes,
an engineer, knew he could stop the truck, which was
headed toward an intersection with stopped traffic.

“I figured I was his last chance of preventing
someone from getting seriously hurt or killed,”
Innes says.

Maneuvering his minivan in front of the truck,
Innes accelerated to the same speed and allowed
the truck to collide with his van,
and then slowed, bringing both
vehicles to a stop. “The key was to
match his speed the best I could
and absorb the impact,” says Innes,
a manager of Boeing’s F- 22 fighter-jet program.

With the van holding the truck
in place, Innes climbed over the
hood to get to the passenger door,
where he was able to get in, take
Pace’s foot off the accelerator and
turn off the ignition.

Pace, 84, of Bellevue, Washington, gives Innes credit for being his
guardian angel, saying only one in
a million guys would have done
what Innes did.

“He did not only save my life,but God only knows who else,”Pace says. “He’s such a brilliantguy to figure out how to do it insuch a short period of time.”Says Innes, “I just wanted todo the right thing. Sometimes you have to makequick decisions.”

AN OFF-DUTY POLICE sergeant, Fredrick Kotto and his then-fiancée, Stanka Vuckovic,were on a Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) trainheaded to San Francisco on February 11, 2013, topick up their marriage license when they heard acommotion behind them and a woman’s pleas forhelp because another woman was attempting tosteal her purse. Kotto observed the suspect standingon a seat with several passengers around her tryingto prevent her from fleeing. Vuckovic, who lost herfather during a robbery, asked Kotto not to becomeinvolved if the passengers were able to detain thesuspect, but matters soon escalated.

“I have all this training and experience, and if Idon’t do something all my training and experienceis a waste.” Kotto says. “Once I saw it had gotten outof hand I had no choice to get involved.”Kotto, 48, who recently retired due to a kneeinjury, has worked patrol, special-operations metrounit, narcotics and covert investigations, and as aninternal affairs supervisor and an internal affairsinvestigator. As an 18-year veteran of the San JosePolice Department, he was worried the suspectmight have not been alone on the train.

“People generally don’t do this kind of thing bythemselves,” Kotto tells The Connection. “I was veryconcerned about other accomplices with guns.”Blocking the suspect’s path, Kotto displayed hisbadge and weapon, and ordered the suspect to theground. When the suspect attempted to pull away,Kotto pulled her to the floor and applied a wristlockcontrol hold.

“Once you’re in that there’s no getting out without breaking your arm,” Kotto says.

When the train arrived at the next stop, BART
police officers boarded the train and took custody of
the suspect. The BART officers allowed Kotto to
phone in his account of the incident to detectives at
a later time so he wouldn’t miss his marriage license